p. 133 – we found out the truth, that’s not valuable to you? – of course it is, but it means i need other words for what i am.

p. 134 – i needed that word to tell me who i was when everything else was coming apart around me. but now i’m wondering if i need it anymore, if we ever really need these words, daungless, erudite, divergent, allegiant, or if we can just be friends or lovers or siblings, defined instead by the choices we make and the love and loyalty that binds us…

you all right? yeah. i mean no, not really. right now i’m just thinking about how meaningless it all was. the faction system, i mean. we put everything we had into it, all of us, even if we didn’t realize we were doin git.

importance of mechanism in place..jane et al. ie: same for war vets – suicide every 80 secs.. so many cover ups/lies/things we don’t really have to be doing/accept.. no? another ie: stem shortage/interest– not a shortage, not an interest.. et al..

p. 243 – genetically damaged people are technically – legally – equal to genetically pure people, but only on paper, so to speak. in reality they’re poorer, more likely to be convicted of crimes, less likely to be hired for good jobs, you name it, it’s a problem, and has been since the purity war, over a century ago. for the people who live in the fringe, it seemed more appealing to opt out of society completely rather than to try to correct the problem from within, like i intend to do.

p. 249 – now that you’re out.. how does the world seem to you? – mostly the same.. people are just divided by different things, fighting different wars.

p. 251-252 – if genetically pure people caused war and total devastation in the past at the same magnitude that genetically damaged people supposedly do now, then what’s the basis for thinking that we need to spend so many resources and so much time working to correct genetic damage? what’s the use of the experiments at all, except to convince the right people that the government is doing something to make all our lives better, even though it’s not?

race to top et al.. testing.. – trillions of dollars.. for nothing

why spend so much time and energy fighting something that isn’t really a problem? – well, the people fighting it now probably fight it because they have been taught that it is a problem.

p. 256 – i’m not saying your genes aren’t different, i’m just saying that doesn’t mean one set is damaged and one set isn’t. the genes for blue eyes and brown eyes are different too, but are blue eyes damaged?it’s like they just arbitrarily decided that one kind of dna was bad and the other was good.

p. 256-257 – but don’t you think a bunch of smart people like these bureau scientists could figure out the cause of bad behavior? – sure, but i think that no matter how smart, people usually see what they’re already looking for, that’s all.

p. 350 – that’s my home you’re talking about you know. – well your home is perpetuating the belief that genetically damaged people need to be fixed – that they’re damaged, period, which they – we – are not. so yes, it’s unfortunate that the experiments still exist. i won’t apologize for saying so.

p. 377 – i feel sick with anger. that they want to stop a revolution, not to save lives, but to save their precious experiment, would be enough. but why do they believe they have the right to rip people’s memories, their identities, out of their heads, just because it’s convenient for them.

p. 412 – the abnegation have teachings about this.. about when to let others sacrifice themselves for you, even it it’s selfish. they say that if the sacrifice is the ultimate way for that person to show you that they love you, you should let them do it. that, in that situation, it’s the greatest gift you can give them.

p. 455 – i don’t belong to abnegation or dauntless or even the divergent. i don’t belong to he bureau or the experiment or the fringe. i belong to the people i love, and dthey belong to me – they, and the love and loyalty i give them, form my identity far more than any word or group ever could.

p. 464 – they gave us the illusion of choice without actually giving us a choice.

p. 526 – we’re all damaged. we mend each other.

– – – – –

after having read the first two, divergent and insurgent, w/o taking notes.. am reminded of the whole memory thing. and the too big to know thing.

how cool if tech augments memory.. gathering everything you want.. then easily/quickly accessible, at your beckon call. like now.. taking notes for allegiant.. i know they would help jog my memory later.. if i want to.. but documenting now takes time, slows the reading, ..

Tris Prior is shocked by the video released to the public at the end of the raid on Erudite headquarters. The video, released by Tobias Eaton, revealed the truth about the faction system and announced that the Divergent are needed outside the borders of the city. Factionless leader Evelyn Johnson appoints herself leader of the city. She begins forcing people to operate under her command and live as factionless citizens. Tension between the factionless and former faction members escalates, culminating in a deadly fight over the bowls used at the faction Choosing Ceremony. Tris questions Evelyn’s motives and is kidnapped by the Allegiant – a rebel group determined to escape the city and reinstate their old way of life – who invite her to a meeting the following night. Meanwhile, Tris’ brother Caleb is put on trial for his assistance under former Erudite leader Jeanine Matthews. Caleb’s betrayal, still fresh in her mind, prevents Tris from completely reconciling with her brother, the only family she has left. On her way to the Allegiant meeting, Tobias informed Tris that Caleb was sentenced as a traitor and is to be executed in two weeks. The Allegiant, led by Cara and Johanna, tell her and the others at the meeting that they are planning to send a group outside the city to find out the truth about their existence and way of life. Tris volunteers to go on one condition: that Caleb is taken with them. Tobias and Zeke break Caleb out of his holding cell before they leave. Tobias, Tris, Christina, Cara, Uriah, Tori, Peter, and Caleb escape the city, during which Tori is killed. After a period of driving through the unknown, they are met by a woman named Zoe and Tobias’ former initiate instructor, Amar, who was supposedly killed for being Divergent. Zoe and Amar take the group to the Bureau of Genetic Welfare, where they meet George, Tori’s brother who was also a Divergent thought to be dead. Here, Tris and her friends learn the truth about their society: several generations ago, the government believed that society’s problems resulted from people’s bad genes. In an attempt to create a better society, they began to correct people’s genes with disastrous results. To rectify its mistake, the government set up ‘experiments’, establishing isolated cities across the remains of the United States in the hopes of raising enough genetically pure (Divergent) individuals to fix the ‘genetic damage’ left in the wake of the Purity War.

Tris and Tobias, being the only two Divergent who arrived, are tested by Matthew and Nita to verify and study their Divergence. While Tris is shown to be truly Divergent, Tobias’ genetic structure indicates that his genes are still ‘damaged’. Tobias is angered by this news and begins to believe that he is a damaged human being. Matthew then brings Tris to the leader of the Bureau, David, to find out the truth about her mother. Sympathizing with her longing, David gives Tris her mother’s journal. Meanwhile, Tobias is secretly asked to join a rebellion, led by Nita, who is also genetically damaged. She tells him that the Bureau is lying when they say genetic damage is the cause of society’s problems. She intends to demonstrate that the genetically pure are flawed as well. Tobias tells Tris about the plan, going against Nita’s warning to keep it secret. Tris is skeptical about Nita’s intentions, but Tobias accuses her of being jealous of Nita and agrees to help.

Shortly afterwards, Nita and her cohorts attack the compound, severely injuring Uriah in one of the explosions. Tris is able to save David and stop the attack, and Nita is thrown in prison for her crime. Tobias begs Tris to forgive him for his mistake and failing to protect Uriah, but Tris scolds him before storming away. Tris is offered a position on the Bureau’s council and is informed of the events taking place within the city, including the Allegiant’s preparations for war with Evelyn and the factionless. David is desperate to stop the violence and maintain the experiment and his life’s work at the expense of destroying the personalities of everyone in the city. He decides to use the memory serum to wipe the memories of the people within the city, allowing the experiment to begin with a clean slate. Tris also learns that the Bureau created the serums that led to the destruction of Abnegation and the enslaving of the Dauntless. Repulsed by the Bureau’s actions and David’s decision, Tris reconciles with Tobias. With her friends, she begins to devise a plan to save her city and fix the Bureau’s flawed ideals. The group decides to break into the Weapons Lab and use the memory serum to wipe the memories of the Bureau to prevent any further discrimination and twisted thinking based on ‘genetic damage’. The Lab, however, is guarded by a fatal dose of the death serum, rendering it a suicide mission. Caleb volunteers for the role, and tearfully asks Tris if it will make her forgive him for everything he has done, to which Tris says yes. At the same time the memory serum is to be released, Tobias, Christina, Peter, and Amar plan to go into the city to inoculate their loved ones against the serum and tie up loose ends.

Christina is able to retrieve doses of the inoculation serum that will counteract the memory serum and instructs the group to inject themselves with it. Tobias notices that Peter only pretends to inject himself with the inoculation serum. Christina gives an extra vial of the memory serum to Tobias, for use against either Marcus (his dad) or Evelyn (his mom) in the hopes of bringing an end to the conflict in the city. Tobias decides to confront Evelyn. Taking Peter and the vial of memory serum, Tobias meets with his mother and gives her the option of drinking it, which will allow her to end the fighting, be born anew, and become his mother again. She embraces Tobias without taking the serum. They meet with Johanna and Marcus to iron out an end to the conflict. On the way out of Erudite headquarters, Peter laments about his bad behavior and violent tendencies which he knows will never change, and elects to take the memory serum to become a new person and forget his wrongdoings. Tobias gives Peter the serum, erasing his psyche for good.

At the Bureau, Caleb is ready to sacrifice himself, but he and Tris, who accompanied him, are ambushed by Bureau guards. Tris pulls her gun on Caleb and decides to carry out the mission instead of allowing Caleb to do so, knowing that Caleb volunteered out of guilt for his actions rather than out of love for Tris. She hopes that her resistance to serums will include the Death variant. However, since she does not know if she will survive, Tris tells Caleb that if she does not return, he is to tell Tobias she did not want to leave him.

Tris destroys the entrance to the Lab and is exposed to the death serum, but she survives. David reveals himself within the Lab and explains that her collusion with the genetically damaged did not go unnoticed. Determined to keep the order and remain steadfast to his beliefs, David shoots Tris, who lunges for the memory serum and releases it. After being shot by David, she sees her mother reach out for her and gladly accepts her embrace, succumbing to her wounds. Tris dies. Tobias, Peter, and Christina return to the compound and are informed of Tris’ fate by Cara. Tobias is overcome with grief, sadness, and emptiness in the wake of Tris’ death. Caleb gives him Tris’ final message. Tobias is angered by the fact that Tris died for Caleb even after his betrayal. Before walking away, Caleb only replies that Tris loved him. Uriah is taken off life support – a decision made by Zeke and his mother – with Tobias still believing that Uriah’s death was partially his fault. Tobias returns to his home in the old Abnegation sector and contemplates drinking the memory serum, but is interrupted by Christina, who reminds him of how Tris would have disapproved of Tobias letting go of the person she fell in love with. Acknowledging the need to move on, Tobias and Christina walk back together.

Two and a half years later, Chicago is finally at peace, with former faction members, factionless, compound members, and other outsiders moving in and out of the city. On what would have been Choosing Day, Tobias releases Tris’ ashes as he overcomes his fear of heights and rides the zip line – a feat performed by Tris during her time as a Dauntless initiate. His memories of Tris and his love for her still linger, but Tobias accepts all that he has been through and reflects on his belief that while life damages everyone, people can still be healed.